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Robin Williams
Robin McLaurin Williams (July 21, 1951-August 11, 2014) is an American actor and comedian. Born in Chicago, Williams began performing stand-up comedy in San Franciscoand Los Angeles in the mid-1970s, and is credited with leading San Francisco's comedy renaissance.1 After rising to fame playing the alien Mork in the sitcom Mork & Mindy, Williams established a career in both stand-up comedy and feature film acting. He was known for his improvisation skills23 and the wide variety of memorable character voices he created.45Williams has been called the funniest person of all time.67 After his first starring film role in Popeye (1980), Williams starred in numerous films that achieved critical and financial success, including Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), Dead Poets Society (1989), Aladdin (1992), The Birdcage (1996), and Good Will Hunting (1997). He also starred in widely acclaimed films, such as The World According to Garp (1982), Moscow on the Hudson (1984), Awakenings(1990), The Fisher King (1991), One Hour Photo(2002), and World's Greatest Dad (2009), as well as box office hits, such as Hook (1991), Mrs. Doubtfire (1993), Jumanji (1995), and the Night at the Museum trilogy (2006–2014). Williams was nominated four times for the Academy Awards, winning once for Best Supporting Actor for his performance as psychologist Sean Maguire in Good Will Hunting. He also received two Primetime Emmy Awards, seven Golden Globe Awards, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and four Grammy Awards. On August 11, 2014, Williams committed suicide in his Paradise Cay, California, home at the age of 63.8 His wife attributed his suicide to his struggle with Lewy body disease.9 Early life Robin McLaurin Williams was born at St. Luke's Hospital10 in Chicago, Illinois, on July 21, 1951.11 His father, Robert Fitzgerald Williams, was a senior executive in Ford Motor Company's Lincoln-Mercury Division.1213 His mother, Laurie McLaurin, was a former modelfrom Jackson, Mississippi. Through her, he was a great-great-grandson of Mississippi senator and governor Anselm J. McLaurin.14 Williams had two elder half-brothers; paternal half-brother Robert15 (also known as Todd) and maternal half-brother McLaurin.16 He had English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, German, and French ancestry.17 While his mother was a practitioner of Christian Science, Williams was raised in the Episcopal Church his father belonged to.1819 Williams wrote a list: "Top Ten Reasons to Be an Episcopalian".20– discuss During a television interview on Inside the Actors Studioin 2001, Williams credited his mother as an important early influence on his humor, and he tried to make her laugh to gain attention.21 Williams attended public elementary school in Lake Forest at Gorton Elementary School (now Gorton Community Center) and middle school at Deer Path Junior High School (now Deer Path Middle School).22 He described himself as a quiet child who did not overcome his shyness until he became involved with his high school drama department.23 His friends recall him as very funny.22 In late 1963, when Williams was 12, his father was transferred to Detroit. The family lived in a 40-room farmhouse on 20 acres12 in suburban Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, where he was a student at the private Detroit Country Day School.2224 He excelled in school, where he was on the school's soccer team and wrestling team, and was elected class president.25 As both his parents worked, Williams was attended to by the family's maid, who was his main companion. When Williams was 16, his father took early retirement and the family moved to Marin County, Tiburon, California.122627 Following their move, Williams attended Redwood High School in nearby Larkspur. At the time of his graduation in 1969, he was voted "Most Likely Not to Succeed" and "Funniest" by his classmates.28 College and Juilliard School After high school graduation, Williams enrolled at Claremont Men's College in Claremont, California, to study political science; he dropped out to pursue acting.1229 Williams studied theatre for three years at the College of Marin, a community college in Kentfield, California. According to College of Marin's drama professor James Dunn, the depth of the young actor's talent became evident when he was cast in the musical Oliver! as Fagin. Williams often improvised during his time in the drama program, leaving cast members in hysterics.30 Dunn called his wife after one late rehearsal to tell her that Williams "was going to be something special".30 In 1973, Williams attained a full scholarship to the Juilliard School (Group 6, 1973–1976) in New York City. He was one of 20 students accepted into the freshman class and one of two accepted by John Houseman into the Advanced Program at the school that year; the other was Christopher Reeve. William Hurt and Mandy Patinkin were also classmates.3132According to biographer Jean Dorsinville, Franklyn Seales and Williams were roommates at Juilliard.33 Reeve remembered his first impression of Williams when they were new students at Juilliard: He wore tie-dyed shirts with tracksuit bottoms and talked a mile a minute. I'd never seen so much energy contained in one person. He was like an untied balloon that had been inflated and immediately released. I watched in awe as he virtually caromed off the walls of the classrooms and hallways. To say that he was "on" would be a major understatement.32 Williams and Reeve had a class in dialects taught by Edith Skinner, who Reeve said was one of the world's leading voice and speech teachers. According to Reeve, Skinner was bewildered by Williams, who could instantly perform in many accents, including Scottish, Irish, English, Russian, and Italian. Their primary acting teacher was Michael Kahn, who was "equally baffled by this human dynamo".32Williams already had a reputation for being funny, but Kahn criticized his antics as simple stand-up comedy. In a later production, Williams silenced his critics with his well-received performance as an old man in The Night of the Iguana by Tennessee Williams. "He simply was the old man," wrote Reeve. "I was astonished by his work and very grateful that fate had thrown us together."32 Williams and Reeve remained close friends until Reeve's death in 2004. Reeve had struggled for years with being quadriplegic after a horse-riding accident.32:16 Their friendship was like "brothers from another mother" according to his son Zak Williams.34 Williams paid many of Reeve's medical bills and gave financial support to his family.3235 During the summers of 1974, 1975 and 1976, Williams worked as a busser at The Trident in Sausalito, California.36 He left Juilliard3738during his junior year in 1976 at the suggestion of Houseman, who said there was nothing more Juilliard could teach him.3139 Gerald Freedman, another of his teachers at Juilliard, said that Williams was a "genius" and that the school's conservative and classical style of training did not suit him; no one was surprised that he left.40 Career Stand-up comedy After his family moved to Marin County, Williams began performing stand-up comedy in the San Francisco Bay Area in the mid-1970s. He gave his first performance at the Holy City Zoo, a comedy club in San Francisco, where he worked his way up from tending bar.41 In the 1960s, San Francisco was a center for a rock music renaissance, hippies, drugs, and a sexual revolution, and in the 1970s, Williams helped lead its "comedy renaissance", writes critic Gerald Nachman.1:6 Williams says he found out about "drugs and happiness" during that period, adding that he saw "the best brains of my time turned to mud".31 Williams moved to Los Angeles and continued performing stand-up at clubs including the Comedy Club. There, in 1977, he was seen by TV producer George Schlatter, who asked him to appear on a revival of his show Laugh-In. The show aired in late 1977 and was his debut TV appearance.31 That year, Williams also performed a show at the LA Improv for Home Box Office.42 While the Laugh-In revival failed, it led Williams into a television career; he continued performing stand-up at comedy clubs such as the Roxy to help keep his improvisational skills sharp.3143 Televised live performances Williams won a Grammy Award for the recording of his 1979 live show at the Copacabana in New York, Reality ... What a Concept. Some of his later tours, after he became a TV and film star, include An Evening With Robin Williams (1982–83), Robin Williams: At The Met (1986) and Robin Williams: Live on Broadway (2002). The latter broke many long-held records for a comedy show. In some cases, tickets sold out within 30 minutes.44 In 1986, Williams released A Night at the Met.45 After a six-year hiatus, in August 2008, Williams announced a new 26-city tour, Weapons of Self-Destruction. The tour started at the end of September 2009 and concluded in New York on December 3, and was the subject of an HBO special on December 8, 2009.needed Hardships in performing stand-up Williams said that partly due to the stress of performing stand-up, he started using drugsand alcohol early in his career. He further said that he neither drank nor took drugs while on stage, but occasionally performed when hung over from the previous day. During the period he was using cocaine, he said that it made him paranoid when performing on stage.46 Williams once described the life of stand-up comedians: It's a brutal field, man. They burn out. It takes its toll. Plus, the lifestyle—partying, drinking, drugs. If you're on the road, it's even more brutal. You gotta come back down to mellow your ass out, and then performing takes you back up. They flame out because it comes and goes. Suddenly they're hot, and then somebody else is hot. Sometimes they get very bitter. Sometimes they just give up. Sometimes they have a revival thing and they come back again. Sometimes they snap. The pressure kicks in. You become obsessed and then you lose that focus that you need.1:34–35 Some, such as the critic Vincent Canby, were concerned that his monologues were so intense that it seemed as though at any minute his "creative process could reverse into a complete meltdown."47 His biographer Emily Herbert described his "intense, utterly manic style of stand-up sometimes defies analysis ... going beyond energetic, beyond frenetic ... sometimes dangerous ... because of what it said about the creator's own mental state."47 Williams felt secure he would not run out of ideas, as the constant change in world events would keep him supplied.46 He also explained that he often used free association of ideas while improvising in order to keep the audience interested.48 The competitive atmosphere caused problems; for example, some comedians accused him of copying their jokes, which Williams strongly denied.464950 David Brenner claims that he confronted Williams personally and threatened him with bodily harm if he heard Williams utter another one of his jokes.5152 Whoopi Goldberg defended him, explaining that it is difficult for comedians not to reuse another comedian's material, and that it is done "all the time".53 He later avoided going to performances of other comedians to deter similar accusations.53 During a Playboy interview in 1992, Williams was asked whether he ever feared losing his balance between his work and his life. He replied, "There's that fear—if I felt like I was becoming not just dull but a rock, that I still couldn't speak, fire off or talk about things, if I'd start to worry or got too afraid to say something ... If I stop trying, I get afraid." While he attributed the recent suicide of novelist Jerzy Kosiński to his fear of losing his creativity and sharpness, Williams felt he could overcome those risks. For that, he credited his father for strengthening his self-confidence, telling him to never be afraid of talking about subjects which were important to him.46 Mork & Mindy After the Laugh-In revival and appearing in the cast of The Richard Pryor Show on NBC, Williams was cast by Garry Marshall as the alien Mork in a 1978 episode of the TV series Happy Days, "My Favorite Orkan".3154 Sought after as a last minute cast replacement for a departing actor, Williams impressed the producer with his quirky sense of humor when he sat on his head when asked to take a seat for the audition.55 As Mork, Williams improvised much of his dialogue and physical comedy, speaking in a high, nasal voice. The cast and crew, as well as TV network executives were deeply impressed at his performance.56 Mork's appearance proved so popular with viewers that it led to the spin-off television sitcom Mork & Mindy, which co-starred Pam Dawber, and ran from 1978 to 1982; the show was written to accommodate his extreme improvisations in dialog and behavior. Although he portrayed the same character as in Happy Days, the series was set in the present in Boulder, Colorado, instead of the late 1950s in Milwaukee. Mork & Mindy at its peak had a weekly audience of 60 million and was credited with turning Williams into a "superstar."31According to critic James Poniewozik, the series was especially popular among young people as Williams became a "man and a child, buoyant, rubber-faced, an endless gusher of invention."57 Mork became popular, featured on posters, coloring books, lunch-boxes, and other merchandise.58 Mork & Mindy was such a success in its first season that Williams appeared on the March 12, 1979, cover of Timemagazine.5960 The cover photo, taken by Michael Dressler in 1979, is said to have "captured his different sides: the funnyman mugging for the camera, and a sweet, more thoughtful pose that appears on a small TV he holds in his hands" according to Mary Forgione of the Los Angeles Times.61 This photo was installed in the National Portrait Gallery in the Smithsonian Institution shortly after his death to allow visitors to pay their respects.61 Williams also appeared on the cover of the August 23, 1979, issue of Rolling Stone, photographed by Richard Avedon.6263 Starting in the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, Williams began to reach a wider audience with his stand-up comedy, including three HBO comedy specials, Off The Wall(1978), An Evening with Robin Williams (1983) and Robin Williams: Live at the Met (1986). Also in 1986, Williams co-hosted the 58th Academy Awards.64 Williams was also a regular guest on various talk shows, including The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson65 and Late Night with David Letterman, on which he appeared 50 times. Letterman, who knew Williams for nearly 40 years, recalls seeing him first perform as a new comedian at The Comedy Store in Hollywood, where Letterman and other comedians had already been doing stand-up. "He came in like a hurricane," said Letterman, who said he then thought to himself, "Holy crap, there goes my chance in show business."66 His stand-up work was a consistent thread through his career, as seen by the success of his one-man show (and subsequent DVD) Robin Williams: Live on Broadway (2002). He was voted 13th on Comedy Central's list "100 Greatest Stand-ups of All Time" in 2004.67 Williams and Billy Crystal were in an unscripted cameo at the beginning of an episode of the third season of Friends.68 His many TV appearances included an episode of Whose Line Is It Anyway?,69 and he starred in an episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. In 2010, he appeared in a sketch with Robert De Niro on Saturday Night Live, and in 2012, guest-starred as himself in two FX series, Louie and Wilfred.70 In May 2013, CBS started a new series, The Crazy Ones, starring Williams,71 but the show was canceled after one season.72 Film Television The first film role credited to Robin Williams is a small part in the 1977 low-budget comedy Can I Do It ... 'Til I Need Glasses?. His first major performance is as the title character in Popeye(1980). There, Williams showcased the acting skills previously demonstrated in his television work; and the film's commercial disappointment was not blamed upon his role.7374 He stars as the leading character in The World According to Garp (1982), which Williams considered "may have lacked a certain madness onscreen, but it had a great core".41He continued with other smaller roles in less successful films, such as The Survivors (1983) and Club Paradise (1986), though he said these roles did not help advance his film career.41 His first major break came from his starring role in director Barry Levinson's Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), which earned Williams a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor.54 The film is set in 1965 during the Vietnam War, with Williams playing the role of Adrian Cronauer, a radio shock jock who keeps the troops entertained with comedy and sarcasm. Williams was allowed to play the role without a script, improvising most of his lines. Over the microphone, he created voice impressions of people, including Walter Cronkite, Gomer Pyle, Elvis Presley, Mr. Ed, and Richard Nixon.41 "We just let the cameras roll," said producer Mark Johnson, and Williams "managed to create something new for every single take."75 Many of his later roles were in comedies tinged with pathos.76 His roles in comedy and dramatic films garnered Williams an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor (for his role as a psychologist in Good Will Hunting (1997)),54as well as two previous Academy Award nominations (for playing an English teacher in Dead Poets Society (1989), and for playing a troubled homeless man in The Fisher King(1991)).54 In 1991, he played an adult Peter Pan in the film Hook, although he had said that he would have to lose twenty-five pounds.77 Other roles Williams had in acclaimed dramatic films include Moscow on the Hudson (1984), Awakenings (1990), What Dreams May Come(1998), and Bicentennial Man (1999).78 In Insomnia, Williams portrayed a writer / killer on the run from a sleep-deprived Los Angeles policeman (played by Al Pacino) in rural Alaska.79 Also in 2002, in the psychological thriller One Hour Photo, Williams played an emotionally disturbed photo development technician who becomes obsessed with a family for whom he has developed pictures for a long time.80 The last Williams movie released during his lifetime was The Angriest Man in Brooklyn, a film addressing the value of life. In it, Williams played Henry Altmann, a terminally ill man who reassesses his life and works to redeem himself.81 Among the actors who helped him during his acting career, he credited Robert De Niro, from whom he learned the power of silence and economy of dialog when acting, to portray the deep-driven man. From Dustin Hoffman, with whom he co-starred in Hook, he learned to take on totally different character types, and to transform his characters by extreme preparation. Mike Medavoy, producer of Hook, told its director, Steven Spielberg, that he intentionally teamed up Hoffman and Williams for the film because he knew they wanted to work together, and that Williams welcomed the opportunity of working with Spielberg.82Williams benefited from working with Woody Allen, who directed him and Billy Crystal in Deconstructing Harry (1997), as Allen had knowledge of the fact that Crystal and Williams had often performed together on stage.83 His performance in the role of a therapist in Good Will Hunting (1997) influenced some real therapists and won Williams an Academy Award.84 In Awakenings (1990), Williams played a doctor modeled on Oliver Sacks, who wrote the book on which the film was based. Sacks later said the way the actor's mind worked was a "form of genius." In 1989 Williams played a private school teacher in Dead Poets Society, which included a final, emotional scene which some critics said "inspired a generation" and became a part of pop culture.85 Looking over most of his filmography, one writer was "struck by the breadth" and radical diversity of most roles Williams portrayed.86 Terry Gilliam, who co-founded Monty Pythonand directed Williams in two of his films, The Fisher King and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988), said in 1992 that Williams had the ability to "go from manic to mad to tender and vulnerable ... had the most unique mind on the planet. There's nobody like him out there."46 Williams voiced characters in several animated films. His voice role as the Genie in the animated musical Aladdin (1992) was written for him. The film's directors stated that they took a risk by writing the role.87 At first, Williams refused the role since it was a Disney movie, and he did not want the studio profiting by selling merchandise based on the movie. He accepted the role with certain conditions: "I'm doing it basically because I want to be part of this animation tradition. I want something for my children. One deal is, I just don't want to sell anything—as in Burger King, as in toys, as in stuff."88 Williams improvised much of his dialogue, recording approximately 30 hours of tape,12 and impersonated dozens of celebrities, including Ed Sullivan, Jack Nicholson, Robert De Niro, Groucho Marx, Rodney Dangerfield, William F. Buckley, Peter Lorre, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Arsenio Hall.89 His role in Aladdin became one of his most recognized and best-loved, and the film was the highest-grossing of 1992; it won numerous awards, including a Golden Globe for Williams. His performance led the way for other animated films to incorporate actors with more star power.90 He was named a Disney Legendin 2009.91 Williams continued to provide voices in other animated films, including FernGully: The Last Rainforest (1992), Robots (2005), Happy Feet(2006), and an uncredited vocal performance in Everyone's Hero (2006). He also voiced the holographic Dr. Know character in the live-action film A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001). He was the voice of The Timekeeper, a former attraction at the Walt Disney World Resort about a time-traveling robot who encounters Jules Verne and brings him to the future.92 In 2006, he starred in The Night Listener, a thriller about a radio show host who realizes that a child with whom he has developed a friendship may or may not exist; that year, he starred in five movies, including Man of the Year,78 was the Surprise Guest at the Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards93 and appeared on an episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition that aired on January 30, 2006.94 At the time of his death in 2014, Williams had appeared in four movies not yet released: Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb, A Merry Friggin' Christmas, Boulevard and Absolutely Anything.95 Theatre Williams appeared opposite Steve Martin at Lincoln Center in an off-Broadway production of Waiting for Godot in 1988.9697 He made his Broadway acting debut in Rajiv Joseph's Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, which opened at the Richard Rodgers Theatre on March 31, 2011.98 He headlined his own one-man show, Robin Williams: Live on Broadway, that played at the Broadway theatre in July 2002.99 Internet Williams hosted a talk show for Audible. The program premiered in April 2000 and was available exclusively from Audible's website.100101 Personal life Marriages and children Williams married his first wife Valerie Velardi in June 1978, following a live-in relationship with comedian Elayne Boosler.102 Velardi and Williams met in 1976 while he was working as a bartender at a tavern in San Francisco. Their son Zachary Pym "Zak" Williams was born in 1983.103 Velardi and Williams were divorced in 1988.104 While it was reported that Williams began an affair with Zachary's nanny Marsha Garces in 1986,105 Velardi stated in the 2018 documentary Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind that the relationship with Garces began after the two had separated.106 On April 30, 1989, he married Garces, who was pregnant with his child. They had two children, Zelda Rae Williams (born 1989) and Cody Alan Williams (born 1991). In March 2008, Garces filed for divorce from Williams, citing irreconcilable differences.107108 Their divorce was finalized in 2010.109 Williams married his third wife, graphic designer Susan Schneider, on October 22, 2011, in St. Helena, California.110 The two lived at their house in Sea Cliff, San Francisco, California.107 Williams stated, "My children give me a great sense of wonder. Just to see them develop into these extraordinary human beings."111 Other interests Williams was a member of the Episcopal Church.112 He described his denomination in a comedy routine as "I have that idea of Chicago protestant, Episcopal—Catholic light: half the religion, half the guilt."113 He also described himself as an "honorary Jew,"114 and on Israel's 60th Independence Day in 2008, he appeared in Times Square, along with several other celebrities to wish Israel a happy birthday.115 Williams was an enthusiast of both pen-and-paper role-playing games and video games.116117118 His daughter Zelda was named after the title character from The Legend of Zelda, a family favorite video game series, and he sometimes performed at consumer entertainment trade shows.119120121 His favorite books were the Foundation trilogyby Isaac Asimov,122 with his favorite book as a child being The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, which he later shared with his children.123 Williams became a devoted cycling enthusiast, having taken up the sport partly as a substitute for drugs. Eventually, he accumulated a large bicycle collection of his own and became a fan of professional road cycling, often traveling to racing events, such as the Tour de France.124125 In 2016, his children donated 87 of his bicycles in support of the Challenged Athletes Foundation and Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation.126 Philanthropy In 1986, Williams teamed up with Whoopi Goldberg and Billy Crystal to found Comic Relief USA. This annual HBO television benefit devoted to the homeless has raised $80 million as of 2014.127 Bob Zmuda, creator of Comic Relief, explains that Williams felt blessed because he came from a wealthy home, but wanted to do something to help those less fortunate.128 Williams made benefit appearances to support literacy and women's rights, along with appearing at benefits for veterans. He was a regular on the USO circuit, where he traveled to 13 countries and performed to approximately 100,000 troops.129After his death, the USO thanked him "for all he did for the men and women of our armed forces."130 Williams and his second wife Marsha founded a philanthropic organization called the Windfall Foundation to raise money for many charities. In December 1999, he sang in French on the BBC-inspired music video of international celebrities doing a cover of The Rolling Stonessingle "It's Only Rock 'n Roll (But I Like It)" for the charity Children's Promise.131 In response to the 2010 Canterbury earthquake, he donated all proceeds of his "Weapons of Self Destruction" Christchurch performance to help rebuild the New Zealand city. Half the proceeds were donated to the Red Cross and half to the mayoral building fund.132 Williams performed with the USO for U.S. troops stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan.133 For several years, Williams supported St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.134 Addiction and health problems During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Williams had an addiction to cocaine.54135 He was a casual friend of John Belushi,46 and the Saturday Night Live comic's death in 1982 from a drug overdose, which happened the morning after the two had partied together, along with the birth of his own son Zak, prompted him to quit drugs and alcohol: "Was it a wake-up call? Oh yeah, on a huge level. The grand juryhelped, too."54 Williams later said of Belushi's death, "It sobered the shit out of me."136Williams turned to exercise and cycling to help alleviate his depression shortly after Belushi's death; according to bicycle shop owner Tony Tom, Williams said, "cycling saved my life."137138139 In 2003, Williams started drinking again while working on a film in Alaska.135 In 2006, he checked himself in to a substance-abuse rehabilitation center in Newberg, Oregon, saying he was an alcoholic.140141 Years afterward, Williams acknowledged his failure to maintain sobriety, but said he never returned to using cocaine, declaring in a 2010 interview: No. Cocaine—paranoid and impotent, what fun. There was no bit of me thinking, ooh, let's go back to that. Useless conversations until midnight, waking up at dawn feeling like a vampire on a day pass. No.135 In March 2009, he was hospitalized due to heart problems. He postponed his one-man tour for surgery to replace his aortic valve.142143 The surgery was completed on March 13, 2009, at the Cleveland Clinic.144 In mid-2014, Williams admitted himself into the Hazelden Foundation Addiction Treatment Center in Center City, Minnesota, for treatment for alcoholism.145 His publicist, Mara Buxbaum, commented that he was suffering from severe depression prior to his death.146 His wife, Susan Schneider, stated that in the period before his death, Williams had been sober, but was diagnosed with early stage Parkinson's disease, which was information he was "not yet ready to share publicly."147148 An autopsy revealed that Williams had diffuse Lewy body dementia, which had been diagnosed as Parkinson's. This may have contributed to his depression.147149150 In an essay published in the journal Neurologytwo years after his death, Susan Schneider revealed that the pathology of Lewy body disease in Williams was described by several doctors as among the worst pathologies they had seen. She described the early symptoms of his disease as beginning in October 2013. It included a sudden and prolonged spike in fear and anxiety, constipation, urinary difficulty, heartburn, sleeplessness and insomnia, a poor sense of smell, stress, and a slight tremor in his left hand. Eventually, she said, he suffered from paranoia, delusions, severe insomnia, memory loss, and high cortisol levels, indicating stress. According to Schneider, "Robin was losing his mind and he was aware of it ... He kept saying, 'I just want to reboot my brain.'"9 Roles ACCE9976-4ABA-43FD-9DB2-A5D6BFC8B7BF.jpeg|Donald Quinelle In The Survivors (1983 film) 29C67359-EC33-4491-A45E-8D4CBF9F3E0D.jpeg|Vladimir Ivanov in Moscow on the Hudson A3FC522C-8601-4342-9596-70A31BF28D3A.jpeg|King of the Moon In The Adventures of Baron Munchausen E397D698-BF42-4FD5-BBC2-098F421301FC.jpeg|Dr. Malcolm Sayer In Awakenings 86E5C9C1-54C3-468B-ACFC-A2F540F93D2E.jpeg|Henry "Parry" Sagan In The Fisher King CF97BD4A-EE95-498F-B29D-AC3DD6EA854F.jpeg|Peter Banning / Peter Pan in Hook 85105F60-CFB2-44BE-ADFD-98B58193D929.jpeg|Alan Parrish In Jumanji 6A66CC33-0659-4655-A284-68D6062014DB.jpeg|Osric In Hamlet 303956EC-6D62-4289-B335-5CE690B0DFB9.jpeg|Jakob Heym In Jakob the Liar C3C68523-4481-4341-AE06-F3FDC6721A82.jpeg|Andrew Martin In Bicentennial Man FC6BAEC0-32B3-4E09-BA48-9B1D78BCB6D9.jpeg|Bob Munro In RV Death On August 11, 2014, Williams committed suicide in his Paradise Cay, California home.8His body was cremated at Montes Chapel of the Hills in San Anselmo and his ashes were scattered over San Francisco Bay the day after his death.151152 The final autopsy report, released in November 2014, concluded that he "died of 'asphyxia due to hanging'" (as suspected by the Marin County sheriff's office on August 12).153154 Neither alcohol nor illegal drugs were involved, and prescription drugs present in his body were at "therapeutic" levels. The report also noted that Williams had been suffering "a recent increase in paranoia".155 An examination of his brain tissue suggested Williams suffered from "diffuse Lewy body dementia".149 Describing the disease as "the terrorist inside my husband's brain", his wife Susan Schneider said, "however you look at it—the presence of Lewy bodies took his life," referring to his previous diagnosis of Parkinson's.9 The Lewy Body Dementia Association (LBDA) clarified the distinction between the term used in the autopsy report, diffuse Lewy body dementia—which is more commonly called diffuse Lewy body disease and refers to the underlying disease process—and the umbrella term, Lewy body dementia—which encompasses both Parkinson's disease dementia (PD) and dementia with Lewy bodies(DLB).156 According to LBDA spokesperson Dennis Dickson, "The report confirms he experienced depression, anxiety and paranoia, which may occur in either Parkinson's disease or dementia with Lewy bodies ... In early PD, Lewy bodies are generally limited in distribution, but in DLB, the Lewy bodies are spread widely throughout the brain, as was the case with Robin Williams."156 Tributes Williams's death instantly became global news. The entertainment world, friends, and fans responded to his death through social and other media outlets.157 His wife, Susan Schneider, said: "I lost my husband and my best friend, while the world lost one of its most beloved artists and beautiful human beings. I am utterly heartbroken."158 His daughter Zelda Williams responded to his death by stating that the "world is forever a little darker, less colorful and less full of laughter in his absence".159Then-President Barack Obama said of Williams: "He was one of a kind. He arrived in our lives as an alien—but he ended up touching every element of the human spirit."160161 In honor of his theater work, the lights of Broadway were darkened for the evening of August 14, 2014.162 That night, the cast of the Aladdin musical honored Williams by having the audience join them in a sing-along of "Friend Like Me", an Oscar-nominated song originally sung by Williams in the 1992 film Aladdin.163Fans of Williams created makeshift memorials at his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame164and at locations from his television and film career, such as the bench in Boston's Public Garden featured in Good Will Hunting;165 the Pacific Heights, San Francisco, home used in Mrs. Doubtfire;166 the sign for Parrish Shoes in Keene, New Hampshire, where parts of Jumanjiwere filmed;167 and the Boulder, Colorado, home used for Mork & Mindy.168 Work on a book biography was begun by New York Timeswriter David Itzkoff in 2014,169 and was published in 2018, entitled simply Robin.170 In addition, a tunnel on Highway 101 north of the Golden Gate Bridge was officially named the "Robin Williams Tunnel" on February 29, 2016.171 On television, during the 66th Primetime Emmy Awards on August 25, 2014, Billy Crystalpresented a tribute to Williams, referring to him as "the brightest star in our comedy galaxy".172173 On September 9, 2014, PBSaired a one-hour special devoted to his career,174 and on September 27, 2014, dozens of leading stars and celebrities held a tribute in San Francisco to celebrate his life and career.175 British heavy metal band Iron Maiden dedicated a song titled "Tears of a Clown" to Williams on their 2015 album The Book of Souls. The song looks into his depression and suicide, as well as how he attempted to hide his condition from the public.176 Shortly after his death, Disney Channel, Disney XD, and Disney Junior all aired the original Aladdin commercial-free over the course of a week, with a dedicated drawing of the genie at the end of each airing before the credits.177 Talk show hosts including Conan O'Brien, David Letterman and Jimmy Fallon paid tribute. In addition, several fans also paid tribute to Williams on social media with photo and video reenactments of the 1989 film Dead Poets Society's "O Captain! My Captain!" scene.178179 The 2017 film Jumanji: Welcome to the Junglefeatures a tribute to Williams by mentioning his character Alan Parrish and using the piece that Williams used in the first Jumanji film. On the film's Blu-ray release, there is also a bonus feature in which the cast and crew pay homage to both Williams and the 1995 installment. In 2018, HBO produced a documentary about his life and career. Directed by Marina Zenovich, the film, Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind, was also screened at the Sundance Film Festival.180 That same year, a mural of Robin Williams was created on Market Street, in San Francisco.181 Category:Comedians Category:Actors Category:Males Category:Jumanji Actors Category:Hook Actors Category:RV Actors Category:Bicentennial Man Actors